Authentically African is an impressively researched study of material culture and its institutions in the construction of Congolese cultural and political projects. Van Beurden's fascinating examination of objects and collections in cultural and political economies makes a significant contribution to several bodies of scholarship, from those focused on material culture, heritage, and identity politics to those concerned with African cultural ... Read moreinstitutions as part of the global landscape.
Joanna Grabski, Warner Professor of Art History and Visual Culture, Denison University [An] impressive exploration of how and postcolonial powers in former Zaire utilized `cultural guardianship' to justify their political legitimacy and to establish cultural and political economies nationally and internationally. This well-informed book is the result of a careful inquiry carried out `on the spot' in Congo, Belgium, and North America. ... Authentically African successfully shows how colonial tensions between politics and creativity left their imprint on colonial as well as on postcolonial Congo. ... This book remains a necessary introduction to some key chapters in the rich and complex entrance of arts premiers into world cultural histories.
Jean-Luc Vellut This is an important book that fills a gap in our knowledge about museums in this geographical area as well as our understanding of the role of political ideologies, a topic which has been well covered in South Africa, for example, but not as much by scholars in other parts of sub-Saharan Africa. ... An impressive analysis. Authentically African successfully shows how colonial tensions between politics and creativity left their imprint on colonial as well as on postcolonial Congo... this book remains a necessary introduction to some key chapters in the rich and complex entrance of arts premiers into world cultural histories. This masterful study of Belgian and Congolese collecting and exhibitions of African arts, and the murky heritage politics so implied, offers insights for understanding colonial and postcolonial histories of representation anywhere in the world.
Allen F. Roberts, author of A Dance of Assassins: Performing Early Colonial Hegemony in the Congo Show Less